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Time for vacation, again. Same hallway, same doors, same outfit even; maybe a little more tense than usual. Not that Jack was ever truly relaxed while he was at the SGC anyway. Years of military training and the ever-present threat of hostility lying in wait just beyond the Stargate meant that he was always at least a little bit on guard. Can’t blame a man for being extra cautious after being beamed up to help Thor with his homicidal robot bug problem though. No, this time he was definitely making it out of the base and going on his vacation. In fact, he’d actually made it to the elevator door and pressed the up button when he heard someone calling out to him from further down the hall.
“Jack, wait.”
His head fell forward, shoulders drooping just a bit, as he sighed and turned around, “Daniel, what can I do for you?” Jack hoped that whatever crisis Daniel had come to get his help with this time was an easy fix or, better yet, something he could delegate or put off until he got back. The man was only just released from the infirmary after his appendicitis with strict orders from Janet (despite his protests of not being military, thus not being subject to orders; doctor’s orders are different) to take things easy for a while, which is why the opportunity for a vacation was still on the table. I mean, how much trouble could the archaeologist really get in to in that short amount of time with those restrictions?
“Ah well…,” Daniel shuffled his feet, hand rubbing his right hip where Jack knew the incision had only just healed, hesitant to continue, “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea after all.”
Jack quirked his eyebrow and waited for Daniel to get to the point. He knew it would happen eventually. The only question was how much exposition he’d have to wait through first.
“I heard that you’re still planning on going to your cabin to fish. Janet and General Hammond have both forbidden me from doing work on any SGC related projects, said something about being sure I would overdo it. So, I was kind of thinking that I could tag along with you and try the whole ‘relaxation’ thing.”
Jack looked at his friend, really looked at him, and if he was surprised by the succinctness of the explanation, he didn’t show it. He saw the dark circles under his eyes, the more wrinkled than usual clothes, the way Daniel stood there fidgeting with a bag that still had the edge of a black t-shirt peeking out of the mostly closed zipper. He also saw the way Daniel’s eyes flit over him, cataloguing him, making sure that he’s really there in the same way he had been checking in on him since Jack and the others returned from Thor’s ship, and he realized that maybe having Daniel along for company is exactly what they both need.
“Y’know, Danny, that sounds like a great idea.” Jack slung his arm around the other man’s shoulder, ushering him in to the just arrived elevator, “There’s been a slight change of plans though; we’re not going fishing.”
“Oh really,” now it was Daniel’s turn to quirk his eyebrow, “Then what will we be doing?”
Jack just smiled and shook his head, “I think I’ll keep that a secret, but it will definitely be relaxing.”
Leaving the base after that turned out to be relatively easy. It was just a few security checks and they were in Jack’s already stuffed truck. A quick stop for gas and snacks, then the two men were on the highway, headed towards wherever it was Jack had decided to go. The drive passed quickly after that with the radio tuned to a random classic rock station, volume turned low enough that it was barely heard above the sound of the engine, Daniel in the passenger’s seat thumbing through a dusty, ancient looking book, mumbling to himself every once in a while, before slowly nodding off to sleep. Jack thoroughly enjoyed the easy monotony of the four-hour drive.
It wasn’t until Jack began to slow down, turning in to their destination, that Daniel started stirring awake, “Great Sand Dunes National Park?” There he went with the eyebrow again.
“You could trust me a little bit, Daniel,” Jack shook his head, turning off of the paved road on to what looked suspiciously like a mule trail, “We’re driving up the Medano Pass to our campsite. There won’t be anything strenuous enough to upset your recovery. I wouldn’t have brought you here if I thought it was going to be an issue. Now sit back and try to enjoy the trip; we’ve got about ten miles until our campsite.”
The campsite they finally arrived at was a welcome reprieve from the bumping and jolting they had to endure on the Pass, they don’t call it a primitive road for nothing after all, and Daniel was quick to jump out and survey the area. It was a nice clearing, as far as clearings go, with a thick tree line on three sides and a small creek to the fourth, with a log bridge to cross and a large field just beyond it full of wildflowers. Between the two of them, they made camp quickly, and settled in to eat an early dinner of MRE’s.
“Okay, how exactly do you find this relaxing?” Daniel finally broke, “Isn’t this a little too much like what we do every day for work?”
Laughing, Jack finished off his meal and started cleaning up before answering, “It’s similar, I guess, but not exactly the same, the danger is significantly less. Besides, we’re not out here just to camp and eat MRE’s. We’re out here because it is an excellent spot to watch the gamma normid meteor shower.”
“A meteor shower?” Daniel questioned, also finishing his food.
“Yep, the gamma normid meteor shower. That’s why I brought my telescope. We should probably head to bed soon though; it’s going to be visible from 0300 to 0400.” Jack shot back, setting the alarm on his watch and banking the campfire.
The two men got ready for bed, not completely dressing down in anticipation of getting up again halfway through the night. Jack tried to give Daniel the chance to get comfortable first, killing time by securing their unneeded gear in the truck and making sure the telescope was properly set up before entering the tent. Daniel was laying on the extra sleeping bag that Jack had packed, back to flipping through the book he had brought. Jack settled himself on his own sleeping bag.
After a while, Daniel closed his book and turned off the lamp. Much like their off-world missions, they were laying back-to-back. They both expected sleep to come quickly, but Daniel surprised them both when he rolled on to his back and picked up where he had left the conversation earlier.
“This still doesn’t seem like it should be relaxing. It’s pretty much exactly what we did on our last mission.”
Jack rolled to his back as well, “Well, Danny, the last mission I was on was nothing like camping. No beaming, no replicators, no Thor. Significantly less excitement, I’ll give you that, but we can’t have everything I suppose.”
“Seriously, you’re making jokes about one of the most dangerous missions you’ve ever been on?” Daniel grimaced, rolling again to fully face Jack in the darkness.
“Well, other than the kidnapping part, it was pretty much just another day at the office. Saving the world and all that,” Jack shrugged. He could feel the lingering tension the last couple of days had brought, tightening his shoulders and chest, but he really didn’t want to dwell on that feeling too long. It was better to take the win and move on, no sense in rehashing it, “Still kinda sad about Thor’s ship though.”
“Jack,” Daniel bit out, “Is Thor’s ship really the only issue you have with that mission?”
“Thor’s okay and recovering, the planet is safe, and the rest of us made it home,” Jack deadpanned, “What else is there?”
“I could’ve lost you.” Daniel choked out, interrupting the other man and fisting his hands in Jack’s sleeping shirt. He pulled their bodies as closely together as he humanly could and buried his face in the other man’s neck to hide the tears streaming down his face, “You could have died. You, and Sam, and Teal’c; there was nothing I could have done. You would have died and I would have been left behind.”
There was nothing Jack could say to that. His job, their mission, meant that they were often in life threatening situations. It was something he hadn’t put much thought in to since his early days in the Air Force. Danger and the threat of dying was just a given. Daniel had always been so resilient and strong though, from the very first moment that Jack had met him, and that sometimes made it easy to forget that this wasn’t necessarily the life he would have chosen for himself. That, at the end of the day, he was a civilian. So Jack wrapped his arms around the younger man and held him tightly as Daniel’s breaths slowed, and then evened out as he fell asleep. He held him long after he should have let go. Only once his watched started vibrating with the alarm he had set did he pull away, and even that was only so he could shake the other man awake and pull him outside the tent, stumbling over his own feet and the uneven ground in his drowsiness.
The two men settled down in the wildflowers and watched as the meteors raced across the night sky. As many amazing things as they had seen in the years since they first started exploring through the Stargate, sometimes the view from Earth was just as awe inspiring. Stargazing had been a refuge for Jack for many years. It calmed him even as it intrigued him, but Jack knew that he would have to break the calm this time. The astronomical event would only be visible for about an hour, and as the meteors began to fade, he shifted closer to Daniel and took his hand.
“Listen, Daniel,” he started, not looking the other man in the eyes at first, “You know what we do is dangerous…”
“I know,” Daniel cut in, but Jack needed to get what he wanted to say off his chest before he changed his mind.
“What we do is dangerous,” he continued, “and I can’t promise that nothing bad will happen on one of our missions. Hell, I can’t promise that nothing bad will happen period, but I do promise to do my best to bring everyone home.”
“Jack,” Daniel started, but Jack still wasn’t finished.
“Everyone, Daniel. If you don’t believe anything else, just believe that. Believe that if something does happen to me, or one of the others, it wasn’t because I didn’t do everything I possibly could.” Finished, he leaned back and loosened his grip on Daniel’s hand, giving the other man the chance to pull away.
Surprising him, Daniel tightened his grip on Jack’s hand instead. They sat in the silence, watching the stars for what felt like hours, before heading back to the tent. Instead of returning to their individual sleeping bags, they zipped them together in to one large cocoon and slept until late morning, wrapped in each other’s arms.
This trip had soothed some of their wounds, but it had led to many more questions and emotions that would have to be dealt with sooner or later. Neither man was the best at dealing with these kinds of issues; they were more used to burying them and pushing through until things worked out one way or the other. Regardless, both men knew that they would do whatever it took to nurture whatever was growing between them. They both believed that the other was worth it.